“Send this message to the New York Javelin,”
are his instructions to the operator. “Rush
it, and I will give you a hundred francs.”

“Cable is engaged,” is the reply.
“Orders from London.”

“What news is London sending over this cable?”

“None. It seems strange to keep the cable
tied up, when there is such important news to be sent.
But the instructions are, ’Send no messages
to the United States.’ I’m sending
an unimportant House of Commons speech.”

“Your wire is free, then? I’ll give
you a thousand francs if you will send this one message
through,” Nevins urges persuasively. “I
want to get the news to my paper. They will pay
royally for it.”

The operator hesitates. A thousand francs is
a tempting offer.

“When will you pay?” he asks.

“I will pay you now, on the very spot.”

As he speaks Nevins counts out the bills.

It is twenty minutes of eight by the local clock in
the cable office.
The clock indicating New York time registers two-forty
P.M.

A glance at the Bank of France notes decides the question
in the operator’s mind. He takes the money
and transmits the message.

Nevins returns to his room to await the developments
of the thirteenth of October.

BOOK IV.

In Freedom’s Name.

CHAPTER XXIV.

THE SYNDICATE IN LIQUIDATION.

The crisis has arrived. On the bulletins in front
of the leading newspaper offices in New York crowds
congregate. Men discuss the startling tidings
that come from all points of the compass and ask themselves
what the next report will be. Golding’s
death is the forerunner of a long list of fatalities.

JAVELIN BULLETIN.

United States Senator Warwick,
of California, was assassinated at
his villa in San Diego.

The murderer, after shooting the Senator,
turned the smoking pistol upon himself and died
with his victim.

This bulletin is posted on the board in front of the
Javelin office.

“What’s happening?” asks one of
the crowd of the man at his side. “Is this
a wholesale butchery planned by Anarchists, or is it
a plot of the Mafia?”

“God only knows,” is the reply.

And to the thousands who stand waiting with breathless
excitement for the next announcement the inability
to locate the source of the outburst of violence is
quite as complete as this man’s. They realize
that a series of appalling crimes has been committed;
yet none can ascribe the least pretext for them.

The name of one after another of the leading magnates
of the land is posted as the victim of a simultaneous
homicide, and the notion that it is the work of anarchists
begins to prevail.